NOTES AND QUEKIES. 



73 



long anterior to even traditionary lore ; and that too many generations of men 

 have passed away to preserve and hand down to the present day an account of 

 remote physical changes, which being local in their nature, and in no way in- 

 terfering with the requirements of man in a nide and barbarous state, living 

 probably by the produce of the chase alone, would make no lasting impression 

 on his uncultivated mind; or it is quite possible that the adjacent district was 

 uninhabited, and that the body may have been transported from the interior to 

 the spot in which it was found, as three noble rivers — the Suii', the Nore, and 

 the Barrow — unite their streams, and flow into the estuary above the village of 

 Passage, to the north of Newtown Head, where a wide expanse of salt-water 

 mingles with the confluent streams as they pass onward to the sea. 



The changes indicated by the rather wide-spread bed of cockles point to a 

 period of time when the waters of the estuary occupied a much wider space 

 than at present ; when the sediment was accumulating to a greater depth 

 before the cockles existed and were destroyed, and the entombment of the 

 human body, than it did subsecjuently. 



In coimection with the remams of man occurring in an ancient raised sea- 

 bed, is the fact that so many flint implements have been found in the drift, 

 which seemingly carries us back to a period when Europe and the British isles 

 were inhabited by a race of savages, among whom the use of iron or other 

 metals was unknown ; and who, strangers to the arts of civilized man, had 

 contrived to make those rude flint imi^lements, which are now found in the 

 drift, to supply the wants of men in a state of nature, testifying to their 

 remote antiquity. 



With respect to the great antiquity of the human race, and considering our 

 method of computing time, the questions naturtdly arise — Are we wlioliy 

 wrong in our clironology ? and. Arc the Chinese and Eg}'ptiaus in their reckon- 

 ing nearer the truth than the western nations ? Every opposition will be 

 made to the proper solution of these questions by those who are averse to the 

 progress of science, and every effort to explain away the facts bearing on this 

 most important and interesting inquiry will be essayed by its opponents. 



Some persons wholly deny that the chipped flints, or " celts," which are 

 found in the di-ift are the work of human hands, and attribute their 

 peculiar forms to the action of running water; others consider that they 

 are the production of some subterranean manufactory, which volcanic explo- 

 sions have sent forth rough cast, so that on cooling they became fractured, 

 and assumed their present forms. Others, again, believe that frost had much 

 to do with shapmg the '^langues des chats." Thus, heat, cold, fire, and 

 water are made to produce one simple effect — in short, anything, except the 

 more rational supposition that they are the vestiges of man's works ; a fact 

 that is admitted by those whose opinions are entitled to much weight in such 

 matters. Whatever age may be finally assimied to the drift and the ancient 

 sea-margins, one thing appears clearly established, namely, that an aboriginal 

 race of men inhabited the earth prior to the superficial accumulations on parts 

 of its surface, and long ere the noble savage had discovered the use of ii'on or 

 other metals, or the secret of their manufacture. 



I found no novel theory on the discovery of the human skeleton in the 

 ancient estuary clay, or the flint implements in the drift ; but I offer these 

 observations, believing that the two facts taken in coimection with each other 

 will stimulate inquiry, and probably lead to a satisfactory solution of a ques- 

 tion highly interesting to man, and which inquiry may tend to establish the 

 truth — which is the chief end and aim of science. — T. Austin, Kingsdown, 

 Bristol. 



Query respecting the Geological Characters of the Gravels of 

 St. Acheul, &c. — Sir, — I do not consider myself to be a geologist, though for 



VOL. III. K 



